Tuesday 20 August - packed up and onto mini-buses and the lot of us are driven to the town of Mulbekh, almost 200 km in the direction of the Kashmir valley. Our accommodation was in permanent tents with electricity and en suite.
Wednesday 21 August - still a day to go before we start at day 5 of the originally planned itinerary, so this is a day for casual riding and seeing the local scene. We rode about 15 km down the valley in the direction of Kargil. Kargil is only 2 km from the Pakistan border and although all is quiet there, the security situation was uncertain enough not to have started the ride from there.
Activity in the valley seems pretty normal to us, grain being dried, packed into bags and weighed.
On the way back, Ursula found an edelweiss beside the stream, which, by the way, was not at all hot or warm - no way would we have sat long in that water.
Not long after getting back on the highway was when Rae's bike started having mechanical issues. First the bearings went on one of his pedals. Good that we are carrying spare pedals, albeit flat pedals, not with clips. Then while achieving at least 8 km/hr as we were climbing back up towards camp, suddenly a bang and Rae's rear seizes - the rim had failed and jammed in the brakes. Only 2 km to go, so disconnecting the brakes allowed us to ride back - it was all up hill so no worries about having to descend with only the front brakes. The bike is unrideable, but within half-an-hour, our wonderful bike mechanic rigged his bike for Rae, the aim being to get an new rim in Leh when we get there in three days time.
Activity in the valley seems pretty normal to us, grain being dried, packed into bags and weighed.
We left the highway for 3-4 km detour into a canyon along a rough dirt road...
...part o the appeal being a hot spring at the end - not really hot and steaming - probably wonderfully hot when it's forty below here in the winter. We were all alone down there and Rae succeeded getting in a skinny dip and was all properly attired for biking again when two cars arrived (must be shaken to bits on that road) with some locals for their bath = pleasant young men whose first question was who told us about this place - looks like it is popular secret amongst the local population.
Tomorrow the serious biking starts.
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